Friday, April 24, 2015

Moseley’s Remor$e

"Former community leader sentenced for stealing Social Security" by Laura Crimaldi Globe Staff April 16, 2015

For years, Frances Kenney Moseley was known in Boston as a “dynamic and well-respected leader” who headed the Boys & Girls Clubs of Boston for part of the 1990s and built a resume that included positions with State Street Global Advisors and the American Red Cross.

But from 2003 to 2010, federal prosecutors said, the 66-year-old Moseley stole more than $220,000 from the Social Security Administration as payments intended for her father were deposited into his bank account for seven years after his death.

She pleaded guilty in September to federal charges of theft of public money and tax evasion and was sentenced last Friday to complete three years of probation and pay more than $470,000 in restitution, court records show.

Some of the money Moseley promised to repay will cover annuity payments issued to her father by Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association-College Retirement Equities Fund, or TIAA-CREF, that were due to cease upon his death in 2003.

Prosecutors said Moseley is a “well-educated, professional, savvy person” who used the money to pay for a “lavish lifestyle” that included a Land Rover, art collection, shopping sprees at high-end retailers and jewelry stores, and one month in which she spent more than $800 on flowers.

US Attorney Carmen Ortiz said Thursday in a statement that given the “gravitas of the fraud,” prosecutors were disappointed that Moseley avoided prison time. They had recommended she be locked up for two years, court records show.While in no way excusing this criminal conduct, my feeling is she should have become a banker instead. She would never have even been charged then.

“For more than seven years, Ms. Moseley illegally obtained nearly half a million dollars from the Social Security Administration and TIAA-CREF, and furthermore failed to pay taxes on that income,” Ortiz said in a statement.That is what they are really angry about.

“Crimes of this nature have consequences for the financial foundations of our government, and sentences for fraud against the government must effectively deter others from engaging in this kind of crime,” she said in the statement.It's difficult to take these blowhards seriously anymore.

Defense attorney Dan Rabinovitz rejected claims that Moseley lived extravagantly and wrote in court papers that she spent at least $117,000 on care for her younger brother, who has struggled with schizophrenia for 40 years.

“Ms. Moseley worked tirelessly in the multiple leadership positions she held in the world of philanthropy and charitable work and to suggest that her lifestyle was a result of anything other than that is a gross exaggeration,” he said Thursday in a statement.Did she collect the illegal dough or not?

Prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memo that by Moseley’s own calculations, she spent more than $353,000 of the stolen money on herself.

Moseley became the target of a criminal investigation after she visited a Social Security office in March 2010 with her brother to ask why the dates and amounts of the payments were fluctuating, Rabinovitz wrote in a sentencing memo filed in US District Court in Boston.

During the visit, she explained the agency was issuing payments for her father, who died in 2003, Rabinovitz wrote. Dr. John A. Kenney Jr. was a pioneering dermatologist whose obituary was published in The New York Times, court records show.

The employee “expressed surprise and indicated the payments would cease immediately,” Rabinovitz wrote.

He wrote that Moseley was not aware that she had done anything wrong.

Moseley “presented herself to the [Social Security Administration] not after reflection on wrongdoing, but rather she went not understandingshe had even broken the law,” Rabinovitz wrote.I have been told my entire life that ignorance is no defense.

By agreeing to plead guilty and pay restitution, Moseley was not charged with collecting more than $248,000 in annuity payments from TIAA-CREF. As part of her punishment, she must spend six months in home confinement and complete 1,500 hours of community service, court records show.

Rabinovitz said Moseley has already paid nearly $125,000 in restitution and is “looking forward to seeking meaningful employment” to pay the remaining sum.

At Moseley’s sentencing hearing, US District Court Judge Indira Talwani questioned why she was prosecuted for tax evasion given that other cases she reviewed involving Social Security fraud did not include that charge, according to an unofficial record of the proceeding. Prosecutors said Moseley avoided paying more than $158,000 in federal income taxes by not reporting income from Social Security and annuity payments.

Talwani also questioned why prosecutors sought two years in prison for Moseley, citing another case involving a smaller theft in which the government requested six months of incarceration.

In letters seeking a leniency for Moseley, her friends and sister detailed her philanthropic work and role as a caretaker for her brother, who lives in a group home in Washington, D.C.

“She has a huge heart,” wrote Marian L. Heard, president and chief executive of Oxen Hill Partners. Heard formerly led the United Way of Massachusetts Bay and United Ways of New England.

“On more than one occasion, Frances has expressed to me that she is so very sorry and is trying so hard to repay these funds,” Heard’s letter said. Reached Thursday, Heard referred questions to Moseley’s lawyer.

Rabinovitz said the prosecution’s request for prison time was “unreasonable.”

Related:"An Andover man who stole nearly $150,000 in Social Security benefits sent to his dead father was sentenced to four months in prison. Graeme Griffith, 60, was also sentenced Thursday in federal court to two years of probation and fined $3,000. He pleaded guilty in January to theft of public money. Prosecutors said that even after Griffith’s father died in 2003, Griffith continued to accept his father’s Social Security benefits. The Social Security Administration detects this kind of fraud through the Medicare Non-Utilization Project, in which the agency investigates people receiving benefits who are at least 90 years old and who have not used their Medicare Part B benefits for three or more years (AP)."He must have had a black heart and no connections to AmeriKan JU$tu$!At least they were not ripping off veterans.

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